Weekend Hot Topic, part 1: E3 2013 verdict

Sony’s E3 media briefing – the best start possible for the PlayStation 4?

GameCentral readers offer their final thoughts on the week’s revelations, from the best games to the worst media briefings.

Everyone knew E3 2013 was going to be the most important games event for years but few could have predicted quite how controversial it would become, with Sony annihilating Microsoft’s stance on used games but the Xbox One fighting back with an impressive range of new games.

Readers have been writing in all week with their initial reactions, but the comments below have all come after taking time to think things over. And yet it’s still obvious that Sony won the battle of hearts and minds with their announcements, although there were still plenty of positive comments about Microsoft and Nintendo’s games line-up.

Flawless victory
For me, Sony was the clear winner at this year’s E3. That the PlayStation 4 will be £80 cheaper than the Xbox One at launch, and will have no DRM or compulsory Internet restrictions forced on the consumer, is very good news indeed. The Kingdom Hearts III and Final Fantasy XV announcements from Square Enix had Japanese role-playing fans salivating – myself included – and it was great to see a healthy dose of support for indie games development, too.

Smaller devs being able to publish their own content on Sony’s machine is in stark contrast to Microsoft’s draconian restraints on indie software. I was also intrigued to see that new title The Order: 1886 is based in a steampunk version of London; a very welcome surprise, even if next to nothing is known about the game itself at this time.

Sony has managed to claw back a lot of respect since the beginning of this gen to the point that that 2006 conference (‘Riiiiiiidge Raceeeeeeerrrrr!!!’) and the PlayStation 3’s subsequent difficult launch are almost a distant memory. The PlayStation 4 could very well return the company to its position of dominance within the industry though, should that happen, I sincerely hope it doesn’t go to their heads again. I also feel a little sorry for Phil Harrison.Mr. Blizzard

The damage is done
After watching all the conferences at E3 I am very happy at the games that were shown and was very impressed with the look of Tom Clancy’s The Division, which stole the show for me, game-wise that is. I did enjoy Microsoft’s conference with its games and Project Spark, and Dead Rising 3 stood out for me and looked a lot of fun to play.

With Sony’s conference though I was very impressed, especially with the amount of games shown and of course the announced price and with no restrictions whatsoever. I couldn’t have asked for anymore and for £349 as well, it’s going to be the first time I buy a console on launch and one I can’t wait to get.

Overall on all the conferences I think Ubisoft did the best regarding games and some of their titles look great fun to play. I feel Microsoft now are really going to struggle purely because of the restrictions on their console, and for them to even compete against Sony now is a big ask unless they can somehow look at taking the restrictions off. Which I very much doubt they will or can, but even if they can do that I think the damage is already done.Rawdog1985 (PSN ID/Twitter)

Least worst
About a third of the way through the Xbox One conference I started to get really bored with the types of game the seemingly overwhelming majority of AAA developers want to deliver. Everything was so grim and over-earnest, like every game was attempting to appeal to teenagers who think they know what real maturity is. And that’s to say nothing of overfamiliar content.

Obviously, this isn’t a new concern in gaming but I was kind of despairing that the new generation would fail to get us out of this rut and I thought Nintendo could be the ones to help move things on, as they so often are.

It looks as though they’re stuck in their own personal ditch, though, and I was very disappointed in their predictability, their lack of surprises and – as GC pointed out – their apparent squandering of world class talent in the form of Retro Studios and EAD Tokyo. I also can’t believe they haven’t revealed a single new in-house developed IP after all this time.

Part of me suspects that they’re winding down support for the Wii U already because third parties and the public have failed to get on board and they want to move on ASAP. It may get one or two classic, pioneering games out in the next year but it doesn’t look likely from where I’m standing and I can’t imagine things turning around if they haven’t done by summer 2014. I’m happy with my 3DS, though and I suspect Nintendo will be focusing more than ever on that machine now.

Overall, a very strange E3 for me, in the respect that if I had to pick a ‘winner’ it would actually be the console that showed the least impressive exclusives. With Sony’s surprise deviation from the expected consumer controls and their apparently more powerful machine costing significantly less than its rival, it was refreshing to see some announcements in gaming that made no sense in a good way for once.

The fact that the PlayStation 4 doesn’t seem to have lost third party support despite its direction means that great exclusives can wait, as they did with the PlayStation 3. Now all I need is for the producers to grow up a bit, quit all the cheesy faux maturity and deliver fresh experiences.Panda

Never too late
I enjoyed Microsoft’s pre-E3 conference, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain and Battlefield 4 looked impressive, especially the jets sliding across the capsizing deck in the latter. Dead Rising 3 was also highly entertaining, especially the air strike and when the zombie was split down the middle.

I strongly believe it’s not too late for Microsoft to think again about their always online, second-hand gaming and DRM policies because they’re making their obviously capable product unmarketable.

Reading some Underbox comments on these pages I decided to check out Ubisoft’s The Division and it’s definitely the most impressive title I’ve seen at the time of writing this letter. A sort of fusion between the Last of Us and Ghost Recon, the voice chat really sold me on the cooperative doomsday experience.

Finally, the biggest E3 mystery to me was Beyond: Two Souls which I previously understood to be a spooky Heavy Rain type adventure game. Somewhere along the line Juno turned into Rambo. I like Ellen Page but she wouldn’t be the first person I’d conscript into the Special Forces.msv858 (Twitter)

Short-term thinking
After the elation of Sony’s conference, in which they affirmed there would be no restrictions on second-hand games or requirements to go online to use them, the Nintendo Direct came as a crushing blow. The first blow was the mediocre looking Super Mario 3D World, which I initially thought was a 3DS title. While encouraged by GameCentral’s report, I cannot help but think it falls way short of the splendour of the Galaxy games. I’d rather a Super Mario Galaxy 3 than this and I have no interest in playing a 3D Mario with friends.

Zelda: The Wind Waker HD has the potential to be a masterpiece, but only if they actually finish the game, get rid of the collect quest and simplify the sailing. None of this was mentioned. Super Smash Bros. was essentially no different to the Wii version. Oddly, none of their in-house games seemed to make any significant use of the touchscreen controller which, aside from the odd party game such as Mario Chase, is starting to look like an expensive gimmick. A Wii U Sports may have helped them here.

The real belly blow, though, came with the announcement that Retro’s ‘secret’ game was another Donkey Kong Country. Aside from the fairly standardised platforming, the first was punishingly difficult. When I think of what could’ve been: a proper follow-up to the Galaxy games, at least one of Wave Race, F-Zero or Star Fox, a new Metroid by Retro or even something altogether new. Unlike Donkey Kong Country, there are obvious benefits of having a second screen with the Metroid series. For example, it could be used as a scanning device, or even to enable attacks beyond the parameter of the TV screen.

Worryingly, Nintendo does seem to be placing focus on making short-term profits which, if they continue in this vein, will undermine their reputation and in the long-term harm the company. The 3DS largely succeeded when Nintendo released one great title after another, almost month by month. This is what they needed to do with the Wii U. So far, it’s looking like the main systems for the more serious gamer are the 3DS and PlayStation 4. I’ll be boycotting the Xbox One.Luma

Rich man’s toy
So, Sony won E3 then. There is now nothing left for Microsoft apologists to fall back on. Killer Instinct sounded tempting until I realised it wouldn’t be a complete game. True, the average man on the street may know little to nothing about the Xbone’s evil, draconian ways – but they will know that it’s 80 quid more expensive than Sony’s machine. And that should really clinch the deal. Unless Microsoft back pedal like mad, they’ve just gone running onto Sony’s sword.

For those who know everything and still choose to buy the Xbone – well, you are certainly making a bold statement about yourself. And the statement that you are making is this: (And please read this while hearing an Etonian, chinless wonder accent) ‘Well, I for one will be getting the new Xbone because I can afford to have the very finest broadband in the realm and buy all my games brand spanking new, wrapped as they are in the most delicate gold leaf plucked off of the trees in the Elysian fields. Come Rupert, let us now hunt some peasants and then eat the finest caviar off the washed backs of impoverished Romanian virgin girls.’ Obviously such a person doesn’t have to worry about lending games as they won’t really have friends.

Barbed humour aside, as I predicted, I really liked what I saw from Bayonetta 2 and Sonic: Lost World. It is perhaps a shame that Nintendo didn’t surprise us – but Bayonetta and Sonic are looking like essential purchases for me. Hmm, the words ‘essential’ and ‘Sonic’ haven’t gone together in a very long time. Isn’t that nice? Mario Kart 8 looked nice too. And is Princess Peach the least likely biker girl ever?DMR
PS: The Order 1886. Something new to get excited about. Huzzah!

No-brainer
Got to admit I was initially impressed with Microsoft’s E3 press conference and the fact they kept to their promise of ‘all about the games’. They had some good exclusives to show too: Ryse, Dead Rising 3, Quantum Break, and Titanfall, among others, all look promising. But then Sony had their conference and wow did they give Microsoft a kicking.

All they basically said was we’re keeping things as they’ve always been and you can continue to play single-player games offline if you wish, without that ridiculous daily check in, and that was enough to create an almost euphoric response from just about everybody who saw it. Everybody I’ve talked to since have said the same thing – I’m getting a PlayStation 4, not one person said they were getting an Xbox One. There were only a couple of disappointments from Sony’s show, no next gen games from Naughty Dog and, of course, no Last Guardian again – I think it’s time to admit that game is never going to happen!

So there you have it, Microsoft have some good exclusives but, who cares, because Sony have a more powerful gaming machine, a better understanding of what gamers want and respect their right to play how they want, have some pretty cool games of their own, especially some great looking indie games and, oh I forgot, it’s £80 cheaper too. It’s a no brainer isn’t it.megablast16

Better luck next time
E3 was, as it always is, a mixed bag. There were good, great, bad, terrible and merely indifferent announcements. As far as shocks went, I don’t think there were that many and things played out more or less as I expected. Nintendo’s line up looks the best (as you would expect from a console that’s almost eight months old) but is spread too thinly to justify purchasing a Wii U yet. Really, they needed to have got a decent head start by the time Sony and Microsoft got to the party and with their announcements it isn’t going to happen.

Still, it wouldn’t be E3 without a poor showing from Nintendo now, would it? It could be worse though, they could be Microsoft. It’s weird but in many ways I think this was Microsoft’s best ever E3. They had a much more diverse range of games than they usually have, and their exclusives looked much more next gen than either Sony or Nintendo. Hey, even Don ‘Snazzy Jacket’ Mattrick wasn’t as painful as he was last month.

But none of that mattered because they had already blown their foot off with their dizzying list of regulations over second-hand sales, lending and Internet connections. Then they fed themselves into the meat grinder, remaining foot first, by being £80 more expensive than a PlayStation 4. And it’s probably being sold at a loss too! All so they can have a Kinect with each unit. The device that doesn’t work, no-one wants and spies on you! Sorry, allegedly spies on you, my solicitor has advised me to say. No wonder Bill and Steve are considered such good business men.

If Microsoft don’t pull a U-turn on all the regulations before November I will be genuinely, genuinely shocked. Meanwhile, Sony shot the sitting duck with the greatest headshot ever seen with their instruction videos. PlayStation Plus being effectively mandatory was a bit of a downer but it’s been the best thing to ever happen to the PlayStation 3 and PS Vita in my opinion. I’ve more than had my money’s worth, and if they can keep up to their own high standards it will be a major triumph for Sony. And while a free copy of Driveclub is the closest thing to a bribe I’ve seen since I watched a BBC interview with a member of the House of Lords, it was another smart touch.

Despite all my naysaying over the next generation, I always intended to buy a PlayStation 4 at some point and if the launch line-up is decent, I may pick one up at launch. But the problem isn’t people like me buying a next gen console. It’s getting casual gamers to leave their phones, tablets and, more importantly, their current gen machines. As a test, I asked the guys at my physio class who would be buying one? They all said they would be sticking with their current machines.

Now all the guys are between twenty and forty and are from a range of backgrounds, but all of them owned either an Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3. In the main they only played Call Of Duty and/or FIFA, and most traded in last year’s version for the next one. And this is the entire problem with things like E3: it preaches solely to the choir. And while that’s no bad thing (getting the hardcore on board early is vital to long term success), on its own it’s no longer enough.

I can’t see how any games company can do enough to make the average FHM reader fork out £350 plus for something most don’t think they need. All the big mainstream games will have current gen versions, and it’s a brave publisher who abandons this gen first. The only way maybe, is to follow Microsoft’s example with the original Xbox and force developers to kill support/turn off servers. The fallout from that would be catastrophic though, and I don’t think Sony, and especially not Microsoft, can afford that.

E3 has, as it always does, raised more questions than answers. It’s been a good show and the third party games look good too. It got the ball rolling, albeit slowly, but I can’t shake the feeling this show had all the hallmarks of a stop gap. I’ll end the same way as I did last week. The real test is next E3. Then we really will have to see something new.andy_b720 (PSN ID)